BQ M10 FHD bricked upon UBport install?

Freebobjohn · 15 Dec 2017, 21:54

Hi everyone,
I've bought an android M10 FHD (this version was on sale) quite some time ago in order to get ubuntu working on it. With Canonical announcing the end of maintenance on their side I felt somewhat desperate, so thanks UBports for keeping this awesome project alive!

Anyway, I've tried to install Ubuntu on my M10 using Magic Device Tool and after completing all the steps I arrived on the "Do not reboot manually!" and "Wait until it reboots on its own!" in my terminal and the tablet was only saying "=>FASTBOOT mode...".
I've been waiting quite some time (~1h) with this screen on and not much happening and decided to reboot via fastboot (using fastboot reboot-bootloader, so not really manually in case fastboot was still busy) and try the command line way. The reboot went fine and got me to the bootloader. I thought I would give a try an other day and turned the tablet off.

However I am now unable to turn it on: turning it on gets me to the android screen with a "Orange State. Your device has been unlocked and can't be trusted. Your device will boot in 5 seconds" message and remains stuck there forever (meaning >2 hours...), never booting. If I try to boot in recovery mode (turn the tablet down, and then turn it back on pressing both Power and Volume up buttons) the android screen appears (without the previous orange state message) get stuck for ~10 secs and reboots without reaching recovery. It then get stuck on the android screen with the orange state message.

I cannot access my tablet with adb or fastboot in any of those states... Do you have any idea onto how to repair this? Is my tablet bricked?
Extra information:

I can turn the tablet off normally
I have tried to use UBportsinstaller as suggested by @UniSuperBox, however I'm stuck in the middle since I cannot reach my device's recovery mode
when stuck on the android screen with the Orange State message and connected to my ubuntu 17.10 computer, the tablet seems to be detected as "MT65xx Android Phone" (I'm not sure what it stands for but at least it is detected as something...) although adb devices and fastboot devices do not find any device

Thanks for your help!

UniSuperBox · 15 Dec 2017, 22:28

You should be able to boot into Fastboot by holding the power and volume down buttons. From there, we should be able to get far enough to install UBports.

Do you have anything older than 17.10 perchance? I ask because we can use the "install using system-image server" instructions on 17.04 and below: https://devices.ubports.com/#/frieza.

If you boot into Fastboot and then run ubuntu-device-flash, you should be good to go. If UDF hangs after trying to download some files, boot the tablet into recovery (it should be installed at that point) and then run the command again without --bootstrap and --recovery-image

Freebobjohn · 15 Dec 2017, 22:41

@UniSuperBox said in BQ M10 FHD bricked upon UBport install?:

You should be able to boot into Fastboot by holding the power and volume down buttons. From there, we should be able to get far enough to install UBports.

Did you mean "holding the power and volume up buttons"?
This is what I'm doing upon trying to reach the recovery mode (and try to select fastboot from there), I've edited my message to make it clearer.

If you indeed meant volume down I have just tried but it seems to give the same results as simply pressing the power button alone.

I indeed have access to older ubuntu versions if needed

UniSuperBox · 15 Dec 2017, 23:50

I've found new information! Holding power, volume up, and volume down at the same time should get you to Fastboot.

Marathon2422 · 16 Dec 2017, 00:06

@UniSuperBox Sounds like he has it fully unlocked,just no system to get booted into
Holding the buttons,can take 12 to 20 seconds to get a result

UniSuperBox · 16 Dec 2017, 00:07

@Marathon2422

Right. But a system has to get installed somehow.

Marathon2422 · 16 Dec 2017, 00:10

@UniSuperBox I used win 10 and B Q's flash tool,and had to have the sound up and plug in and out to hear the usb driver start to work
Am I wrong here,android m10 fhd,needs to be flashed to Ubuntu touch and then reflashed to ubports,which gets the partitions set up correctly ?

Freebobjohn · 16 Dec 2017, 15:38

Thanks for your answers

Holding power, volume up, and volume down at the same time should get you to Fastboot.

I have tried to hold the three buttons together (even for a long time, ~1 minutes) nothing happens until I release them. The tablet then powers on and get stuck and the androïd orange state message screen

NeoTheThird · 16 Dec 2017, 21:45

@freebobjohn said in BQ M10 FHD bricked upon UBport install?:

I have tried to hold the three buttons together (even for a long time, ~1 minutes) nothing happens until I release them. The tablet then powers on and get stuck and the androïd orange state message screen

Do you see anything else in that screen, any menue items perhaps? If so, you should be able to select something along the lines of Bootloader, Fastboot or Recovery? You might be able to move the highlight with the volume buttons and select with the power button.

Marathon2422 · 17 Dec 2017, 02:48

I just wasted 1\2 a day trying to change my m10fhd from android back to Ubuntu touch,and then to ubports,the way you are trying
Get the hard reset tool from BQ and use that I can give you my serial no, to get a download of Ubuntu touch.
Put the flash tool into firmware upgrade mode,with your m10 connected and turned on in any way it will. Then with your PC sound turned up,click the big Download button,then get your m10 to change modes IE.on from off,or recovery to bootloader,and listen to the PC,and watch the bottom of the flash toolscreen,it take a windows puter and authorising the drivers,,start with drivers ADB folder,then Drivers hard reset,then,open the flash tool, I am on eastern time,in TN.USA, if I can help,or video it and send it

dbosley · 19 Dec 2017, 00:23

Marathon, I softbricked my Ubuntu M10 over the weekend trying to port over to ubPorts and was able to get it back by reimaging it using spflash tool and the latest Cannonical image. (all mentioned above) And then I was able to port over to ubPorts using magic device tool. I started with my M10 in fastboot mode but I'm not sure it mattered to spflash as it changed states to the boot menu during the process and it was suggesting I reboot. I did not but, after a lonnnngggg wait, it finished. Connected to a Net book running Mint. (I don't know if this helps at all.)

dbosley · 19 Dec 2017, 00:27

Sorry, I meant to send this to free bob.

Freebobjohn · 19 Dec 2017, 15:23

@neothethird said in BQ M10 FHD bricked upon UBport install?:

Do you see anything else in that screen, any menue items perhaps? If so, you should be able to select something along the lines of Bootloader, Fastboot or Recovery? You might be able to move the highlight with the volume buttons and select with the power button.

Nope there is nothing to select from. To make it clearer I have attached pictures the two screens I can access:
Here is what I call the "android" screen (the one I can access by pressing power and volume up trying to access recovery):

Here is what I call the orange state message screen:

The orange state screen with a zoom on the actual message:

Freebobjohn · 19 Dec 2017, 15:28

@marathon2422 said in BQ M10 FHD bricked upon UBport install?:

I just wasted 1\2 a day trying to change my m10fhd from android back to Ubuntu touch,and then to ubports,the way you are trying
Get the hard reset tool from BQ and use that I can give you my serial no, to get a download of Ubuntu touch.
Put the flash tool into firmware upgrade mode,with your m10 connected and turned on in any way it will. Then with your PC sound turned up,click the big Download button,then get your m10 to change modes IE.on from off,or recovery to bootloader,and listen to the PC,and watch the bottom of the flash toolscreen,it take a windows puter and authorising the drivers,,start with drivers ADB folder,then Drivers hard reset,then,open the flash tool, I am on eastern time,in TN.USA, if I can help,or video it and send it

Thanks a lot for your answer, indeed my serial number cannot give me access to the official ubuntu (and BQ refuse to give me access to it, I had already asked a long time ago) it would be awesome if you could send me yours via personal message
Why do you actually think ubports cannot be flashed directly?

Freebobjohn · 19 Dec 2017, 15:32

@dbosley
By softbricked do you mean you had the same problem as the one I have? could you still access your recovery? (I guess so if you could access the fastboot mode)
My worry is that these tools use adb or fastboot under the hood, i'll give spflash tool a try now, even just to get android back on the tablet

Marathon2422 · 19 Dec 2017, 19:35

@dbosley Check how much memory is used up by the os, (4gb) ish

tupp · 19 Dec 2017, 21:52

@Freebobjohn
I am a complete Ubports newbie, but I was in a similar sounding situation yesterday, after I interrupted the installation process on my Nexus 5. I was stuck on a screen with a Google logo with an icon of a small, open lock. I didn't see any "orange state" nor "trusted" nor "rebooting messages."

I was able to get the Nexus 5 back into the fastboot screen by running "fastboot oem unlock" in a terminal on my Antix Linux PC while the Nexus 5 was connected to it.

As I recall, I was root when I ran that command, while my Nexus 5 was turned on, displaying the stuck Google screen.

You can also try this method with your BQ M10 FHD turned off. After entering the fastboot command in the terminal, a fastboot message should appear saying, "< waiting for any device >." Then, try to press (and hold?) the various possible button combinations to get it into fastboot mode.

I tried MDT with a Lubuntu liveUSB, but I was unable to get it to work. Ubports-installer worked for me. If you use ubports-installer, make sure not to touch any of the options when "Ubports Recovery" screen appears -- it is counter intuitive, but that screen probably means that the installation is proceeding.

dbosley · 19 Dec 2017, 22:20

FreeJohn,
No, I was able to get to the screen with the Fastboot option using the volume up/power button option. it was there that I had difficulty. When I booted with just the power button, I got a screen similar to your first picture with 'ubuntu' on it.

dbosley · 19 Dec 2017, 22:25

@marathon2422 Ubuntu uses 8.4 GB on my M10. I have noticed a long boot time on it compared to the Cannonical load. Also, in case I was not clear, this is an M10 Ubuntu Edition vice Android.

Marathon2422 · 20 Dec 2017, 02:03

@dbosley looks like you could flash twrp,wipe it and reinstall ubports to get back about 4 gb